“I doubt they will answer right away.” He moved to sit beside her on the tree branch. He looked around for a moment and took in a deep breath. “This is a beautiful place. I can see the appeal.”

“But there’s no one here. It’s so isolated.”

“They have each other. Perhaps that is all they need.”

“Perhaps,” she said. She could understand that. The Wraiths were a very insular society. They lived in cells, each house containing multiple generations from the same family. It was only at the Kinua, the gatherings of the cells, that they were exposed to other Wraiths. Where they could find mates if they so desired. Even so, Wraiths did not get married and did not move into the family houses of other Wraiths. Not usually. They merely mated if they wished to and got pregnant, the females keeping the child in their houses and freeing the males of all responsibility toward that child. It was a cold transaction, just like all the other transactions between Wraiths. If not for their sex drive there would be no new generations of Wraiths. But while the Wraiths had no real emotions to speak of, they did have an intense sex drive. They were not sexually attractive, did nothing to attract a mate, but they did want to rut and rut hard when the mood fell on them.

“If they only have each other, I imagine they don’t have things like half-breeds in their society.”

“Perhaps. There could be indigenous tribes around here that might attract their attention.”

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

He paused a beat. “What is so bad about being a half-breed?” he asked gently, knowing it was a touchy subject.

She winced. “It’s a testament to the weakness of the mother. A living testament. It’s worn like a scarlet A on the chest.”

“The mother? What about half-breed children sired by the father?”

“We don’t have those. In our society the mother rears the child. If a male strays from his race…well, he leaves the product of it behind if there is any. Just like they would with a Wraith female.”

“But then that’s leaving a human woman with the rearing of a Nightwalker child. A child that can’t go out in daylight.”

“Oh, we can go out in daylight. We just can’t phase in daylight. It turns us solid. Takes away all of our preternatural abilities. Makes us…in a word…human.”

“But surely they look different.”

“You mean like me? I’m sure they do. But there are ugly humans all over the world. It’s not really given a second thought.”

“You are not ugly,” he snapped at her. “Far from it.”

“I’m ugly to a Wraith. And isn’t that all that matters? Unless I want to find a mate from the human world, which I don’t. I wouldn’t do that to a child—Raise it up in a house where it would be spit upon and ridiculed.”

“Not every mating ends up in a child.” He paused. “So you don’t have children?” It was a question he hadn’t thought to ask. Had he forced her to leave her family behind?

“No. I haven’t…I’m not…” She set her chin. “I am not what you would call an ideal choice for a Wraith male. Perhaps one day there will be a male who won’t care that I’m a half-breed, but that day hasn’t come yet.”

“Do you mean to tell me you’ve never had sex? Fifty years on this planet and you’ve never had sex?”

“No Wraith has ever wanted me. My only other choice would be a human male, and I already told you why I won’t do that.”

“But surely you’ve wanted to…”

“Of course I have! Sometimes so badly I ache all over from it! Luckily for me the craving—the overwhelming urge to have sex that Wraiths experience—hasn’t hit me so hard that I am blinded by it, as happens with the rest of my people. Thankfully my sex drive is one of the things affected by my being a half-breed. I have seen Wraiths go mad from being denied a resolution to the craving. Can you imagine what would have happened to me if I’d been a half-breed with a full-bred dose of the craving? No one would have wanted me so if I didn’t choose a human partner I would go crazy with need.”

“Your society sickens me,” he said with heat, his hand wrapping around the side of her neck, his thumb feathering along the length of her jaw. “I’m sorry, but it does. It’s cold and callous and prejudiced beyond reason.”

She nodded and whispered, “But it’s all I know.”

“You could easily pass for human. You could live in the human world.”

“I wouldn’t know how. And it would cut me off from all the Wraith resources. Money, comfort.”

“Comfort! What about the way you live is comforting?”

“Well…there’s my gardening.”

“You could easily garden in the human world.”

“Well why don’t you live in the human world?” she rounded on him. “You are practically human!”

“Only the touch of the sun paralyzes me.”

“So? Humans live their lives in the night too.”

He got her point. But his existence wasn’t an abused one. Not really.

Or was it? Nowadays most hated the sight of him. But he had given them good cause. She had done nothing to deserve the contempt of her peers besides being born. It was different. She didn’t deserve it. He did.

“But maybe in the human world you could find people to accept you. To love you,” he insisted.

“I’m a Wraith,” she said quietly. “We don’t need love.”

“You’re a half-breed, and I can see that you do need it.”

He saw tears well up suddenly in her eyes. “I don’t want to. I wish I had been born without these emotions. It would have made life so much easier.”

“But you weren’t born without them. You have them and you have to accept them. You have to accept that you have needs that the Wraiths aren’t fulfilling for you. If you do that then maybe you can move on to a situation that is far healthier for you.”

“I’d be an outcast for the rest of my life,” she whispered.

“You already are an outcast,” he said gently.

He was right. She was an outcast. She always had been and always would be. She would never belong anywhere. It was a saddening thought and it made her heart feel heavy in her chest.